Ole's Blog

One of the four immigrant families that form the starting point for cousin Orrin Moen’s book, Whence We Came, is that of Amund Amundsen Volden, whose grave I visited at Coon Prairie in 2009.

This is an important line; the one that Orrin traced back to King Haakon V and all that medieval royalty. Orrin’s sources are not listed in the database he shared with me, so I have been trying to match some of the facts with sources that I can find. Amund Volden’s baptismal name was Amund Amundsen Dalsegvolden. Here is his christening record from Sør-Fron:

Here is a link to the image at digitalarkivet. Born 11 Sept, christened 04 Oct. Parents (unmarried!) are Amund Olsen Roen and Anne Amundsdatter Dalsegvolden. Sponsors included John(?) Gryttingsmoen, Johannes Röen, and Kari Roen, and two others, illegible. No sponsors from Dalseg or Dalsegvolden, interestingly. Final note in the parents’ column, underlined for emphasis: begge 3ri (…?) to the effect that this was the third illegitimate child for both parents. I think we have the makings of some scandal here.

From this point, things get complicated, due to the frequent changes of peoples’ surnames. Orrin’s data, and that on Tor Onshus’ excellent site, Genealogy from Ringebu and Gudbrandsdalen, name Amund Olsen Roen’s father as Ole Olsen Kongsli, and also give the date of Amund Olsen’s birth as 1801. Like Orrin, Tor also traces this line back to Haakon V. Anyway, maybe Amund Olsen “Roen” was also a “Kongsli?”

Sure enough, I found the christening of Amund Olsen Kongsli, 29 November 1801. Parents are Ole Olsen Kongsli and Marit Amundsdatter. Sponsors include Tosten Lunde, Ole Lunde, Kari Lunde, Marit Kongsli, and one illegible. Lunde is the farm that mother Marit Amundsdatter came from. Amund must be the second son of the couple, thus is named after his maternal grandfather (father of Marit Amundsdatter).

But I need some evidence that the two Amund Olsen’s are the same person. Nothing in these two christening records point in that direction, so I decided to look for later records of Amund Olsen Kongsli and/or Roen. So far, nothing further on A. O. Roen. Amund Kongsli was confirmed in 1817. No information there, except for his name. But the next record I found cast some doubt on the “dual” identity. Amund Olsen Kongsli married Anne Olsadatter Tagestad 28 June 1830, nine months after the (illegitimate) birth of Amund A. Dalsegvolden.

This is somewhat upsetting for a couple of reasons. If we are looking at the same person, it seems quite odd that his surname changed from Roen, *back* to his natal surname, Kongsli. Also, the one witness to this marriage is Ole Kongsli (probably the groom’s brother). There are no Roen’s, or even Tagestad’s, listed. Still nothing to tie the two names together.

Another interesting detail in this record is a note to the effect that the marriage was permitted by a letter of acceptance from the KING! Wow, I have never seen anything like that before. A chat partner in Norway speculated that it may have been because the bride and groom were related, e.g. first cousins. Another possibility is that permission may have been needed after the three illegitimate children born earlier to the groom and another woman. Hmm … I wonder if that letter may be on file at the Sør-Fron church. A long shot, but something to check on while I am “in the neighborhood.”

In any case, it seems that the family had some connections in high places. Remember that the Kongsli line is the one leading back to the Fairhair dynasty 400 years earlier. Indeed, the farm name itself contains the Norwegian word for “king.” It is not documented, but historians believe the farm may once have belonged to the Crown. Of course, if that was between 1400 and 1814, it would have been the king of Denmark, whereas at the time of this marriage, the king of Sweden ruled over Norway.

But I digress. Final exhibit:  the christening of Ole Amundsen Tagestad in 1834, son of Amund Olsen and Anne Olsdatter. Yikes, another surname change! Apparently, the married couple took up residence at the bride’s family farm – not at all unusual. Sponsors/witnesses include Ole Kongsli (clinching the parents’ identity), and Anne, Tor, and Embjør Roenstad. At last, a possible connection with the Roen farm. Unfortunately, the handwriting is not very clear. Instead of Roenstad, it might be Rolstad, another farm in the area (and home of some other ancestors of ours). In the former case, the evidence is frail; in the latter, non-existent. Another quandary to pack along to Norway … Stay tuned.

As I observed when discussing the arithmetic, most or all people are likely some degree of cousins, however distant; ergo, most or all married couples must be each other’s cousins. So, it is not surprising that I have already found the “cousin-hood” of my own parents, and one set of great-grandparents. In both cases, the common ancestor I identified was way back in ancient history, i.e. before 1100 CE.

Now, upon closer study of my ancestors in Norway, I find that my paternal grandparents, Isaac Larson and Anna Moen, may also have been cousins; in fact, not nearly such distant ones. The common ancestor is John Nilsen Nordgard Bryn, who appears in the “farm and family book,” or bygdebok for Fron parish. He was the father of Nils Johnsen, the earliest farmer the book names for the Skurdalshaugen farm, in 1723. Birth and death dates for the two are not given. The key here is the farm name: Skurdalshaugen. Although I do not have positive documentation yet, I believe that the same Jon Nilsen was possibly also the father of David Jonsen, also of Skurdalshaugen. According to the Ragnhild Letter, David Jonsen was born in 1737, which is a bit problematic, as I will show later.

Starting with the common ancestor, here are the two lines:

John Nilsen Nordgard Bryn
Nils Jonsen Skurdalshaugen b. ? (was adult by 1723)
John Nilsen Skurdalshaugen, b. 1742(?)
Nils Jonsen Maurhaugen b. 1758 (? improbable – only 16 years after father)
Mads Nielsen Maurhaugen b. 1796
Anne Madsdatter Maurhaugen b. 1829
Marie Amundsdatter Volden b. 1858
Anna Moen b. 1888

John Nilsen Nordgard Bryn
David Jonsen Skurdalshaugen b. 1737(?)
Lars Davidsen Skurdalshaugen b. 1763
Anne Larsdatter Skurdalshaugen b. 1801
Ole Larson b. 1841
Isaac Larson b. 1884

If correct, this makes Isaac and Anna fourth cousins, twice removed. The separation by two generations between husband and wife seems counter-intuitive at first, but is really quite plausible. Note that only two generations back, the grandmothers are already 28 years apart.

The necessary leap of faith is to assume that David Jonsen’s birth date is incorrect. To be proprietor of a farm in 1723, David’s (possible) brother Nils must have been born before about 1700. It is unlikely he would have a brother more than 37 years younger than himself. Not impossible, though, at least for a half-brother; Ole Larson’s thirteen children (by two wives) spanned a period of 29 years. But if David’s correct birth date were around 10-15 years earlier, say 1722-1727, all the numbers would work quite well. Keep in mind that the churchbooks (kirkeboker) for Fron parish prior to 1799 were destroyed by fire, so no vital records are extant for the period in question. I did not find David Jonsen in the bygdebok, and do not know how Ragnhild came up with the date.

Of course, I have been proven wrong on assumptions that seemed a lot safer than this one. Another puzzle to take along to Norway in August.